Winning is Losing
by DSLeo
Summary: An AU conversation between Luke and Lorelai after the series finale, about their problems, leads to other conversations. Four chapters total.
1. Chapter 1

You Win

Summary: A conversation set after the series finale. Luke and Lorelai realize something about themselves and their history.

Genre: Angst

Rating: T

AN: So here's a take on what was really wrong between them the whole time. AU, naturally.

GG GG GG

"I know what screwed us up."

"Really," said Luke, wiping down the last table in his diner.

"Yep," replied Lorelai, putting chairs in place at tables he had already wiped. "Sports."

"ESPN did _not_ lead to our problems! Geez, Lorelai, can't I take one damn hour away from you without having you play the guilt card?"

Lorelai metaphorically pounced, though in truth she stood very still behind a chair, her hands curled on its back, while Luke glared at her, hands on hips and ball cap askew. " _Played_. Exactly. Oh, and you assumed I was upset about ESPN. When I didn't mention ESPN. But that's part of the problem, too."

Growling through grinding teeth, Luke held onto his patience. "Will. You. Please. Make. Sense?"

Lorelai hunched her shoulders, and whispered, "We were playing. The whole time. We were playing."

His cleaning rag was flung across the diner. "I was not _playing_!"

"I said _we_ ," sighed Lorelai, and her mouth drooped. "It was a game, Luke. This, you, me, it started as a game. Me flirting to get you to react, you not reacting to prove my flirting didn't get to you, that's how it started. I mean, we talked sometimes, about real things, but mostly, it was…"

Luke sank onto a chair , which squeaked against the floor. "Oh," he said gustily, and took off his hat, ran his hands over his thinning hair. "It was who'd win. The flirting game. You flirt, I ignore, and…"

"And somehow we thought someone would win, but the thing is, you can't _win_. It's not a game," replied Lorelai, sinking into a chair herself, some ten feet away from Luke.

"It's not a sport," agreed Luke, grasping his hat in both hands and twisting it. "You think we acted like we were scoring points. Who got who to react more."

"And that's fine, if that's all you want. But it's not… It started to be about winning. All of it. Who I dated, who you dated, you asking me about the cruise with Nicole, you building the chuppah, we… I… You…" Lorelai groaned and let her gesturing hands fall feebly to her sides.

No less grim-faced than she, Luke let the hat fall. "We were playing a gigantic game of chicken. To make the other one blink."

"Is it a date, is it not a date, even that…" Tears trickled from the corners of Lorelai's eyes. "Pining, not pining…"

Eyes closed, Luke said heavily, "Telling, not telling. If you really loved me, then you'd let me win."

"The game. Only the game was our lives, and what could've been _our life_."

Shuddering Luke opened his eyes and met her gaze without flinching. "So if I'd asked you out before Rachel came back?"

"You wouldn't have. You were still waiting for her."

"No," said Luke. "I was waiting for her to admit she was wrong and I was right, and all she ever did was stay until we fought more than we talked, and if I really wanted to marry her, I'd have asked her and we'd have found a way, but I needed to win."

"Don't," implored Lorelai. "Don't beat yourself up. Okay? Please? You're a guy, you're competitive, and… And I goaded. I goad. It's what I do. It's how I won against Emily. Because she always has to win. Even when she says she's surrendering, she's winning."

"Like telling me it's okay to be with you," remembered Luke with a slight cringe. "I swear, I was going to go talk to you, I was."

"Before or after you 'beat' Emily?" asked Lorelai tonelessly, and the grief in her eyes rendered her oddly ancient. "Believe me, I know about that. I know all about that. Maybe that's why I'm like that. Emily had to beat Trix, and Dad's idea of a good day at the office was beating someone else out of a deal, and…"

"And my dad couldn't go a week without finding some way to say he scored points over Taylor," interjected Luke glumly, shoulders slumped. "Hell, the thing with Nicole… Move, don't move, it was who wins, part of it was always who'd _win_. I don't even know why. My parents argued, but not like that. Not like one had to win before they'd love the other one."

"Well, that's your parents," sighed Lorelai, pushing her palms against her eyes against some phantom vision of her past. "Mine? Yeah. I think the reason I'm an only child is that Dad is even more stubborn than Mom when it comes to that whole who wins the marriage thing."

"Okay, too much information, but…" Luke hunched slightly. "You're right. I'm right. We're both right. But we can't both be right, or nobody wins, and you have to win…"

"And you have to win…"

"Or at least not lose…"

"And then you don't tell me about April because that cost you points?" asked Lorelai with honest curiosity, her forehead etched with a frown.

"Actually," admitted Luke, red to the ears, "that was about beating Anna. You got benched. That means…"

"I know what it means. ESPN, remember?"

Luke conceded her point with a tiny flick of a finger. "And then Chris won."

"Nobody _won_!" cried Lorelai suddenly, rocketing to her feet. "Nobody won! We all lost! We lost us! We lost years! We lost our happy middle! _Nobody won_! Everything's _lost_!"

She fell back into the chair, sobbing.

"Crap," whispered Luke, and rubbed his forehead.

"I know it's sorta normal, nobody wants to be the loser or always be the bad person, but…" Lorelai sniffled, took napkins from a newly resupplied holder, and blew her nose. "But what did we think we'd _win_? You can't win at marriage, I remember someone saying that, and, and…" Her head dropped into her arms, muffling the rest of her words. "And we were so busy with who's right…"

Luke stirred, though he did not stand. "Why did you want to win? The flirting thing? When it started?"

Mopping her face, Lorelai shrugged and confessed, "I liked you and I wanted you to ask me out. I didn't know about Rachel. And then… It was about getting you to even react, because I just… I just… Okay, fine, I was pathetic, okay? Desperate. I just wanted anyone and everyone to like me, go ahead, mock away!"

Luke cleared his throat and toyed with his ball cap a moment, before setting it on the table at his elbow. "I told myself I was proving I was better than Rachel. I wasn't cheating. I win. Go team."

"Wait, is it cheating if you're broken up?"

"No," snapped Luke, "it's not, okay? It's not. And I know when April was conceived, I don't need a reminder I wasn't better or worse or whatever the hell I was thinking, I was… It was something else to win? I don't know. In my head I'd have these scenarios where I'd imagine her telling me she was engaged, and I'd be able to throw it in her face that I was faithful and she wasn't even if it wasn't true, and don't ask me to explain, okay?"

"I didn't," said Lorelai sharply, "I was trying to figure out what the deal was between you and Rachel between her visits. You never said."

"I knew I was treating you like crap. I saw how rotten you felt. I didn't care. I was busy, and if you really loved me, then you'd stick around no matter how bad it got. No matter how bad I got. And then you _didn't_!" he accused, voice rising.

Flushed, Lorelai hissed, "If you want to play the blame game, then I guarantee I can win. All the crap you gave me about Chris, before anything ever happened, and you wouldn't even come _home_ , you'd be at Anna's till forever and then stay at the diner and I had no idea if you were with her or _with her_ , and I didn't ask because that wasn't trusting you, and I trusted you, and you _left_! So yeah, you didn't want me, I got drunk, I slept with Chris! How long was I supposed to wait, Luke? How long till you decided I was worth your time again?"

"As long as I damn well decided! I had to think of April!"

"So you cut her off from part of your life?" Lorelai pointed to herself.

"Anna…"

"You cut me out, way before Anna went ballistic! Stop blaming it on Anna!"

"You married him!"

"You married Nicole!"

"You brought him to my town! To _our_ house!"

" _Your_ town? And by then it wasn't _our_ house, you didn't even keep toothpaste in the bathroom!"

They were nose to nose, on their feet, screaming at the top of their lungs. Face nearly purple, vein throbbing, Luke bellowed, "You're a joke! That's why I didn't want you near my daughter! So she wouldn't turn out like Rory!"

Ashen, Lorelai slapped her hands over her mouth as if to stop vomit.

Gesturing energetically, Luke roared, "Yeah, committing adultery, having sex at her grandparents' vow renewal, stole a damn yacht, great kid _you_ raised!"

Lorelai backed up a step with each of his words. Her hands dropped and she fumbled for the purse on the table behind her.

Chest heaving, Luke stopped, and his color ebbed to sickly gray.

Feebly, Lorelai said, "Okay. You win."

She turned, clutching her purse, and was running for the door when Luke jeered, "Yeah, run. Run to _him_ , why don't you? Oh, he didn't want your crap either!"

Lorelai placed her hands on the glass door of the diner, head down, shoulders buckling. "I _said_ , you _win_. You can stop now. You _win_!"

She did run, then, the bells on the door jingling in her wake.

Trembling, Luke leaned on a table, alone with his victory.

GG GG GG

AN: Dark, angsty, angry. It's my life right now.

I know the Luke-lovers will hate me. Lorelai didn't grovel enough and she was mean. And Lorelai-lovers will hate me. Luke didn't grovel enough and he was mean. The point being, is it really about keeping score on who did what to whom, how often? And if it is, just who won and who lost?

Yeah. You don't "win" relationships. You sure can lose them, though.

I am aware my non-humor fics are not welcome. Oh well. Flame away. I have tissues and chocolate. I'm prepared.

Cheers!


	2. Chapter 2: LorelaiEmily

Winning is Losing Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Not mine.

AN: A multi-chap. From me. I'm incredibly anxious about this. *meep*

This chapter will center on Lorelai and Emily.

I hate stories that don't obey my orders. Thank you for your patience and kindness.

GG GG GG

Lorelai leaned heavily on the frame of the door to the Gilmore mansion. The cars in the driveway told her it was her mother's afternoon to host something. It didn't matter what. DAR, garden club, hospital committee, Greater Hartford Area Rich Women Society, it all blurred together for her. The same thirty women, rotating from one club or committee or society to another, and back, vying for position and jockeying for bragging rights on whose events were the most successful.

Bleeding though she was, Lorelai risked the sharks. This once, she was going to be unashamed, and admit the truth.

A maid opened the door, saying, "Mrs. Gilmore is busy and cannot…"

"Tell her I need my mom," said Lorelai.

The maid left the door gaping wide. A maw, mused Lorelai. The mouth of a beast that chewed on her and gnawed at her, and yet, here she stood.

Emily bustled into view, the clack of her high heels punctuating her irritation. "For heaven's sake, Dominique, you never leave the… _Lorelai_?"

"I need my mom," said Lorelai again, and burst into tears.

Mouth hanging open, her mother stared at her.

"I'm sorry, you're busy, I'll go," mumbled Lorelai, and turned, trying not to scuff the soles of her worn canvas Keds. The noise had always irked her mother.

Behind her, she heard, "Dominique, tell the ladies to relocate, there is a family emergency. Then bring tea to the patio. Lorelai, come with me."

"Please, Mom, don't yell, please?" begged Lorelai, stifling sobs as Emily snatched her by the elbow. "Please, I know I didn't call, and I broke every rule, I know, I'm sorry, I…"

"Be quiet, Lorelai."

Chin falling to her chest, Lorelai lapsed into silence and followed her mother along the manicured path that led to the patio. The pool house was clearly visible, and at the sight of it, Lorelai tried to stifle the memories it evoked. She emitted a tiny, agonized whimper, quickly swallowed and turned into a wobbly smile.

Once seated in the shade of a potted row of palms utterly out of place in Connecticut, she pulled her knees to her chest, looping her arms around her shins, and her ancient jeans popped a little as a knee finally gave way to time and wear. A moment later, she dropped her feet to the flagstones and straightened, fixing her face into a blank mask of courtesy. "I apologize for disturbing you, Mom, you didn't have to cancel your meeting, I…"

The look on her mother's face was pure hurt.

"Mom? Are you okay? Is Dad okay? What is it, what's wrong?"

"You came to see me, the maid said you told her you needed me, and you're apologizing," replied Emily softly, and blinked back tears. "Oh, Lorelai."

Battling to keep her shoulders squared, Lorelai quickly said, "Mom, it's not like that, I'm not trying to hurt your feelings, I came on impulse and I saw it was a bad time and you raised me better than that and…"

"I raised you to apologize for coming to me when you need me?"

Lorelai's mouth shut into a thin pink line. She dropped her gaze to the mosaic tile on the table and asked brightly, "Did you find this in Europe, it's…"

"It's from Mrs. Kim's store, don't change the subject!"

"I'm sorry, Mom, I only wanted… I had… I wanted to talk to you and tell you something, and I'm messing it up, I mess up everything, you're right, I can't do anything without screwing up, and, and…" Shivering a little, Lorelai clamped her hands around the edge of the table. A fingernail broke. "I'm sorry, Mom. I'm so sorry."

"What on earth for? This time, I mean?"

Flinching, Lorelai sniffled out, "I'm sorry. I never realized. I mean, I did when Rory left to spend the night here because she was mad at me, and all the rest of the times, I know how it made you feel, how you felt, me turning my back on everything you like, and having Rory walk away from her home for what I ran away from, and…"

"Lorelai, you're babbling." For once, it was said gently, and helped Lorelai regain some fraction of composure.

The maid brought a tea tray. The tea was iced. Emily growled disapprovingly but did not comment. She squeezed lemon into her glass. Lorelai tried, but her fingers did not manage the wedge very well, and some juice squirted onto her shirt. Another failure.

Somehow, that made it all easier. Clearer. _Verbal_.

"I never understood why you always said my failures made you look bad, why that mattered, they were _my_ failure. And I'm sorry for that, Mom." She cleared her throat, sitting up straight again, her eyes meeting her mother's. "I apologize, Mom. I didn't think people really care what your kid does. Especially an adult kid. That they really do blame you. For everything your kid screws up. But they do, and I'm nothing but a screw-up, and I apologize, Mom. I never really thought anybody would blame you for _me_."

An odd frown puckered Emily's forehead. "Blame me for you?"

"For me getting pregnant and not marrying Chris back then or all the spectacular loser-ness that is Lorelai Gilmore," explained Lorelai, her voice and her will cracking under her mother's stare. "I mean, it was my mistake. Mistakes. Plural. Not you. You were always telling me I was doing things wrong, I'm the one who didn't do them right, and…"

"What happened?"

The fear in Emily's voice shocked Lorelai into saying, "Luke finally told me the real reason he didn't want me. Near April."

"And this has to do with me?"

"No," snapped Lorelai, and destroyed a vanilla wafer in a fist. "It's because Rory… He said I'm a joke, that he didn't want me near April because Rory turned out to be a felon and an adulterer, and he threw something in there about the vow renewal, and it finally sunk in, it finally hit me, you've had to hear that _all my life_. And I'm in my _thirties_. All you've ever had to hear is how you're a screw-up because _I_ am, and nobody ever told me that about Rory, that was the thing I did _right_ , only now I didn't, and I thought maybe Luke and I could talk out our problems, only… Here I am arguing with you. Because that's what we do. We argue. We have to win." Unclasping the crumbs of the wafer, she let them fall onto a plate with remarkably dainty precision. "I don't know what you win, it sure as hell isn't a perfect daughter, but I'm tired, Mom. I'm tired of trying to win whatever weird thing this is we have." Lowering her voice with effort, Lorelai inhaled shakily and concluded crisply, "I needed my mom. I needed to apologize, for how other people treated you because of me. I wanted to tell you that karma came around and bit me in the butt. Thank you for the time and the tea, and I apologize again for interrupting your afternoon. You really didn't have to stop the meeting on my account."

"You came to me."

"And screwed up your day, yes, Mother, I know," sighed Lorelai, pushing herself to her feet. "I think I apologized, but I'll apologize again, I should have called ahead and…"

"Lorelai Victoria Gilmore, sit down!"

Startled into obedience, Lorelai sat down. The patio chair squawked a protest.

Emily's eyes shone. "You came to me. Oh, Lorelai, you said you needed your _mother_ , not my help, _me._ I never thought you'd need me. You've always been, forgive me, so like Trix."

"I'm like Trix?" grimaced Lorelai, though she had loved her late grandmother, the First Lorelai.

"Oh, so damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead," gestured Emily vaguely, and put her hand out to Lorelai. Frowning, Lorelai took it, surprised yet again when her mother squeezed. "Nobody blames you for Rory's mistakes."

"You did," said Lorelai bluntly.

Emily's face flamed bright pink. "And you do, but Lorelai, when she lived with you? Rory was an excellent student, everyone said how polite she was, she read books and worked hard and I… Oh, I wished you'd been that way."

Face falling, Lorelai admitted, "I know."

"Oh, for heaven's sake, Lorelai, you were a very good student and that was despite all the parties and nonsense, what I wished was that you'd been that way because it meant…" Emily smiled sadly at her. "It meant I would've done it right. Oh, don't be naïve, people did talk and did say awful things, but I'm the one who didn't _stop_. Bitty Shelton tells me all the time how she wishes her daughter…"

"Ingrid?"

"That's the one, yes, ankles like a rhinoceros," sniffed Emily in disdain. "How Ingrid needs to have Lorelai's spunk and Ingrid needs to work to get ahead like Lorelai has and Ingrid should have done more than, well, whatever it is Ingrid does."

Scrunching up her forehead, Lorelai went fishing in memory. "She used to make her own skin lotions."

"Well, she can't even manage that, apparently, and…" Emily succumbed to emotion with a sigh and another hand-squeeze. "I had an image of what you should be. You had an image of what you wanted to be."

"And I failed both," interrupted Lorelai, tears dripping down her face. "I'm a lousy person, and a lousy mom. I should've let you raise Rory from the start. She'd have been better off. This is her world." With a sour smile, Lorelai added, "I know she only got onto the campaign because you and Dad pulled strings. Hello? Theft of a yacht? Pretty sure the Secret Service doesn't approve."

"Oh, piffle, that was…"

Lorelai had no idea why her mother stopped. Why Emily drew away her hand, and suddenly choked back an audible sob. "Mom?"

Emily's hand shot up to halt her.

Lorelai shrank back and nervously drank iced tea with far too much lemon in it.

"I could say many things, Lorelai," Emily at last remarked, "about Luke, Rory, and much more, but I think what you need to hear is the truth. I never forgave you for failing to be what I wanted you to be, and that… That is my doing. I've tried to do better."

"You've been great, Mom, you paid for Chilton and…"

"Don't interrupt!"

Lorelai twitched, and bowed her head to accept the rest of the tirade she felt certain would come.

"I couldn't celebrate you as you were, are. You're correct. Somehow, I had to win this strange battle with my own child over who my child would be. It is exactly what Trix tried to do to me, and I hated it. Loathed it, in fact. I had to fit her ideas, her notions, and she set the bar so high no one could possibly succeed."

Sympathy flooded Lorelai. "I know, Mom, I should've been more…"

A quick flash of Emily's glare shut up Lorelai. "And I did that to you. I don't know why. Truly, I don't. At first, I was disappointed that you weren't this ideal child I'd dreamt, and then… Habit?" Emily pursed her mouth. "I don't know. It bothers me. Since your father's heart attack and surgery, I've come to realize how much I rely on you, Lorelai. How much you try, how much you do. I used to be terrified of getting old. Who would take care of us? Who would take care of _me_? But… When your father was so sick…" Emily blinked and dabbed at her eyes with a napkin. "When I needed you, truly needed you, to drive me or to arrange the funeral for your grandmother or… You came to help me. And I realize, today, you came to me. Yet you're apologizing for interrupting my day. As if you're not more important to me than the Hartford Library Association."

"I'm an adult, I should be able to…"

"Lorelai. How many times did you come to me, or try to talk to me, as a child, and I said I was busy or I scolded you about your hair or your clothes or your music or, well, _you_?" Emily's hand indicated an elegant shape inclusive of all matters Lorelai.

Cringing inwardly, Lorelai answered sturdily, "I stopped going to you so you wouldn't yell at me, so I don't know."

"Whereas Rory comes to you. And when she had that affair with that dreadful boy Dean… When she committed a crime… She came to us knowing you would disapprove of her actions. What's worse, I look back and I wonder…" Emily swallowed, a hand at her throat. "Did I use that to prove I was _better_ than you at being her mother? Sometimes, Lorelai, since she left, I look back and I wonder. Why on earth did we abide her dropping out of Yale or use our connections to mitigate the consequences of her actions? We never did that with you. You came to us, told us you were pregnant, and did we care what you wanted, did we give you the pool house? No. Yet if we had…"

"I'd have taken it," said Lorelai hastily, shyly, "if it meant I raised Rory with _help_ instead of… Um… Never mind."

Emily smiled thinly, reached over, and patted Lorelai's hand. "I think we're both old enough to stand honesty from each other. If I had a diamond for every time your father asked me to shut up about your not being married and about having Rory so young… I'd be hip-deep in diamonds." Her smile warmed, softened. "I do think that he considered taping my mouth shut a few times."

"He wouldn't be the only one," said Lorelai thoughtlessly, gasped, and gawked at her mother in horror at her own words.

Emily laughed.

Lorelai pinched herself. She was awake.

"Trix said it on the wedding day, dear," chortled Emily, smirking at some memory. "If only she could've taped my mouth shut to prevent the 'I do'. Then she muttered, that way she had, 'Oh, I suppose that would not be civilized, Richard will realize his mistake soon enough'!" Snickering, Emily broke a vanilla wafer in half and offered part to Lorelai, then dunked her own into her iced tea, to Lorelai's amazement. "Oh, don't look so mortified, I've been known to dip a cookie into my cocoa at Christmas. My point is, Lorelai, I failed as a mother but not because you had Rory so young or ran away. I failed because I didn't want to admit you were going to be your own person. You did that with Rory. She didn't always make wise choices…"

"I know, and I should've taught her better!"

" _But_ ," corrected Emily, "at a certain point, you can't be blamed. You did not encourage her to have sex with a married man or to steal a boat or drop out of Yale. You opposed those decisions. She made mistakes, all children do, and she made even bigger mistakes, as all adults do."

Scowling, Lorelai pushed away from the patio table. "I wanted her to have everything. And Luke's right. I failed. You're right. You'd have been better at…"

"Lorelai," interrupted Emily curtly, and made a show of waving the white napkin in the air. " _I surrender_."

Baffled, Lorelai stared at the white cloth, then her mother, and stammered, "But. It's not. We're not. This isn't a war, Mom."

"Nevertheless," retorted Emily coolly, tossed down the napkin, and stood. "I surrender. I no longer care who is or is not better or worse. I only want to have my daughter feel she can come to me without _apologizing_ for it."

Through a lump in her throat, Lorelai echoed, "I surrender, too," and rose a little uncertainly.

Her mother embraced her gently. "I love you, Lorelai."

"But I'm a screw-up," Lorelai wept onto her mother's shoulder. "I never got married or…"

"I think I see why your father grew tired of hearing me go on and on about the fact you weren't married," commented Emily with a hint of a laugh in her voice. "Let it go, Lorelai, I'm here. I'm here."

Lorelai sobbed, "Mom. I love you. Thanks for loving me."

"Whyever wouldn't I?" wondered her mother, stroking her curls, and Lorelai understood there was far less to fear in surrender than she'd thought. Perhaps not at sixteen, or thirty, but now?

Now, she could need her mother, and be needed by her mother, without a scoreboard flashing overhead.

.

GG GG GG

AN: Mom-daughter goodness, I hope. But it is also, with luck, showing that these two are well on the way to a lasting reconciliation. There is a reconciliation with Luke planned, but first Luke needs to talk to a relative…


	3. Chapter 3: LukeJess

Winning is Losing Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Usual yaddas blahs and so forth. You can guess by now I would've done it differently if it's mine, so duh, not mine.

AN: This chapter, Luke seeks out…Jess.

I am very grateful to all reviewers, readers, followers, etc., not necessarily in that order. Thanks. A first time out in a multi-chapter fic is scarier than it looks.

GG GG GG

The look on Jess Mariano's face should've sent Luke rolling with laughter, if he was the kind of guy to roll with laughter.

Instead, he snapped, "Can I come in? Before the next drive-by?"

Jess backed away, letting the door to Truncheon bang softly shut. He flipped the sign to _Closed_ , yanked a curtain across a display window. "Trouble?"

Luke countered, "I can't visit my nephew?"

"In Philadelphia." Jess folded his arms, perhaps meaning to mock Luke's own posture, and snorted. "Yeah. Right. I knew you'd be upset about the summer plan change with April, but I didn't think it'd be bad enough to get you out of Taylor-ville."

Rubbing his forehead to erase a traffic-induced scowl, Luke growled, "If that's some movie reference…"

Jess turned his back, jerked a thumb toward a cluster of furniture. "You look like hell. Grab a seat."

Luke flopped gratefully into a chair meant for customers and, from the cloud of stink that arose, anyone who smoked cigarettes. Too tired to complain, he let himself sit in the stench and stretch his legs, waiting for Jess to deliver tea. It was a very nice change to be the served and not the server.

Mug in hand, and mug delivered to Luke, Jess lounged across from him on what was more or less once a sofa. "Probably should've had that chair fumigated after the last poetry reading."

Luke shrugged.

Jess sat.

A clock ticked.

After the tea was gone, and his headache eased back into his shoulders where it typically lurked, Luke said, "Last week. I called Lorelai a bad mother."

Jess fumbled the mug he was holding. "Lorelai? _Gilmore_?" Setting the mug carefully on a low table, Jess shook his head. "You told her she sucks as a mom?"

"She does! Look what Rory's done! I had to keep that away from April!" Leaping up, Luke energetically paced once around the chair, gesturing pointedly. "There's the whole Dean thing, and the way she blamed you for the broken arm, and Rory's dad, and dropping out of Yale, and Emily, and…"

"Which Gilmore are you…"

Ignoring his understandably baffled nephew, Luke plopped into the chair again to punctuate his final words. "And the stolen boat!"

Jess's face scrunched into a knot. "I'm gonna regret this. But I need material for a novel, what the hell. You. Called. Lorelai. A. Bad. Mother."

"Yes! She is!" Luke nodded as if that decision had been written in stone, though he couldn't quite not wince.

"Okay. And Liz?"

"Lousy." After a half a heartbeat, Luke added a belated, "Nothing personal."

"No, I agree, where I'm concerned," replied Jess, now blank-faced. "Emily Gilmore?"

"Pfft," snorted Luke.

"Anna?"

The toneless single syllable hit Luke like a slap. He felt his body warm, chill, break into a sweat. His jaw clenched until it popped. All he could summon was the word, "Uh…"

"Know what, I'll re-direct or whatever it is lawyers say."

"I hate lawyers."

"You married one."

"Don't remind me."

"What, that you couldn't get married to anyone until you were too drunk to see straight?"

"That's not…" Luke began, and faltered, finally threw down his ball cap with a grunt. It missed the nearby table and landed on the sofa near Jess. "Okay. Yeah. But…"

"Words of wisdom. One of those funny videos off the internet."

"Nothing with kittens," warned Luke, leaning exhausted into the smelly chair. His eyes slid shut. He flexed his aching hands. He'd driven non-stop to Philly from Connecticut, trying to avoid New York City _and_ New Jersey. While it could be done, it was not necessarily any less harrowing than accepting the miseries of Interstate 95 in summer. Mainly, air with enough pollution to qualify as a liquid, if not a solid.

"Yeah, you know me, I love them kittens," drawled Jess. "The words of wisdom are, if you have to be drunk to do it, then you shouldn't do it."

Luke snorted. Even he wasn't sure what he meant by it.

"Thought you got the girl, hurray, happy ending."

Luke stared at his insolent, wary-eyed nephew. Something rose up, choking him, and he leaned forward, elbows on knees. "This isn't how it's supposed to be."

"Well, if it means calling the love of your life a bad mother, yeah, I…"

Anger flared. "What do you know about Lorelai? Or mothers?"

Eyes narrowed, Jess shot back, "Mine sucked, you'd come bail her out and never once did you look twice at the kid in the corner hoping someone'd come bail _him_ out."

The blood rushed to Luke's face, fled, and he slumped back in the chair yet again. He tried to find words. None appeared. Only images of a young blurry thing that was probably Jess, cowering away from the crying and yelling adults.

"And you wanna talk about mothers? How perfect was yours?"

"Don't talk about my mom!"

"Don't talk about my mom," mimed Jess, with a viciousness that startled Luke. "What are you, five? Look, if Liz is to blame for me, and Lorelai's to blame for Rory, guess who's to blame for you and Liz?"

"That's different!"

"You're right, your dad was there, that's more than Rory and I can say!"

Pouncing on what mattered, Luke pointed an accusing finger at his nephew. "Exactly my point! I have to be there for April!"

"Yes, people with two parents never turn out badly! Look at you! No, wait, don't look!"

"What the hell're you talking about?"

Jess's dark eyes glittered. "What are _you_?"

The silence returned, hostile, thick with the dust of books and, Luke imagined, the ghosts of browsing eyes. Or, he admitted, much less fancifully, the glare oozing from Jess not unlike heat from an improperly sealed oven.

Jess drew a long, slow breath, surprising Luke when he said calmly, "Let me guess. You got angry, won the battle, lost the war, and now she won't come near you."

Reluctantly, Luke confessed a grim, "Yeah."

"Jackass."

"Thanks."

"Seriously, you called her a bad mom?"

"She threw Nicole in my face."

"She should."

"And she threw Chris in my face…"

Jess cocked an eyebrow.

Teeth grinding, Luke glared. "Okay, I brought him up, but… She kept _pushing_! Why can't she just leave it alone? We're, we _were_ ," Luke relentlessly self-corrected, "getting back together, why do we have to talk about the whole thing?"

Jess's frown conveyed oceans of confusion. "Wasn't not talking what broke you up?"

The question's sincerity blasted through the anger Luke had been nursing for many days. His thoughts turned to the sort of white fuzz he associated with poor radio reception. His energy fled. Tide out, rocks bared, strange smells and slimes coming to light…

He said, "I bought a boat. In a day."

Jess waited with uncannily irritating silence. Luke had never before realized how silence could _goad_. His own refusals to talk abruptly took on new dimension.

"And I bought that building because Taylor wanted it," he continued, to fight that dark-eyed glower. "And the Twickham House. But that's different, that's… Things change… But… And… Crap."

With a showy twirl of the hat in hand, Jess slapped the ball cap backwards onto his own head and clipped out, "In a word: Yep."

"Take that off, you look ridiculous."

"So do you. Aren't you a couple decades past that whole slacker-skateboarder-grunge look?"

"What do my clothes have to do with anything?"

"They make the man. Saw it on a t-shirt."

Luke snarled, "Make a point or…"

"Or what? You'll throw me out of my own business?"

Subsiding with a grumble, Luke conceded that, but reiterated, "We said our apologies, we had a stupid argument, now she's avoiding the diner again!"

"You called her a bad mom," Jess said quietly. "Why'd you cross a line like that?"

"She…" started Luke, and wondered abruptly why he was arguing this with Jess. He'd already argued it with Lorelai.

Something turned over in his gut, leaving him queasy. It tasted like defeat.

"I'm guessing Liz was honest when she was drunk. Or high. Or… They don't have a word for what she was when she did crack, and I'd know." Jess grunted, standing with an unreadable curl to his mouth. "I need more coffee. I take mine Irish, you want some in your tea?"

"You're drinking? Alcohol?"

"It's legal. Jack in your tea, or straight?"

Unable to believe himself, yet forced to by strength of evidence, Luke said, "Straight."

Jess poured, shut the whiskey into a cupboard under the register, and returned. Luke thanked him, glad to see he'd used clean mugs, and sipped without tasting.

"I'm a couple-four shots ahead, so the words are liquid over here," said Jess lazily. "I heard it from Liz all the time. Perfect Saint Luke, Perfect Dad William, Sainted Dead Mommy, Wonderful Dead Stupid Town…" His lip lifted in canine-baring contempt. "Bad Liz. Bad Liz. She talked about herself like she was a dog that stained the carpet." Jess raised his mug to Luke. "Can't imagine where she learned to think that way."

Flush creeping up his neck, Luke yipped out an indignant, "Hey!"

"I was a kid, not deaf. Young, not stupid." Dropping his voice into what Luke considered an insulting imitation, Jess griped, "Geez, Liz, what's wrong with you, get it together, grow up, what would Mom and Dad say, you're embarrassing them, you know better, I have better things to do than listen to your crap, Liz…"

"I never said those…" began Luke, and again, his own memory prodded him with a sharp pointy stick.

"Eh, you were right. But sometimes, _Uncle_ Luke, I wonder why you hate it so much if I call you _Uncle_ Luke."

"I'm proud of you!"

"Now, yeah. Now that I play by the rules you like. Now that Liz does, you're proud of her, too."

"That's not… I… You're twisting this!" snapped Luke, arms folded and feet re-planting themselves on the floor.

"It's already twisted!" shouted Jess, lunging to his feet so suddenly that Luke bounced to his own, ready to deflect a punch. "Show me the book that says you only deserve love if you do it the Danes way! Where is it? Is it in this aisle?" ranted Jess, storming down an aisle, a fist punching at a book as he passed. "How about this shelf? Is it this book? No, wait, this one! Hey, look, a religious book, maybe God spoke and it's here! Nope, this one doesn't tell everyone to live the Danes way, either!"

"It's not about that, it's about doing the right thing!"

"Like hell it is! All you ever said about kids was that they're sticky and noisy, don't drop more suckers into this mess, can't imagine why someone decides you're anti-kid! But when it's time for consequences, it's all still supposed to go in your favor?"

Red-faced, shaking, Luke roared, "What the hell is your problem!"

Jess flung his arms wide, a book skittering through the air and landing heavily by the door. "You're always preaching, but out of what _book_? Is it the one that told Liz what a bad person she is? Is that the book you have, because that's the one _she_ preached out of!"

Shaken, Luke stepped out of range of his nephew's white-knuckled fists. "April has to come first," he said, hating how weak, how irrelevant the words sounded.

Jess spat, "Then why didn't you move to New Mexico?"

Shoulders hunching, Luke stammered, "I…"

"Yeah, _you you you_!"

"What are you yelling about!"

" _This_!" seethed Jess, and threw his empty mug across the bookshop. "This! You get another chance, God, man, how many do you need, and you just don't _learn_! The words! You gotta be careful about words!" He slapped a pile of books. " _They last_!"

Head spinning, Luke retreated to the smelly chair, but did not sit. He looked down, finding he'd put it between himself and Jess.

"Sorry," mumbled Jess, and sprawled on the sofa, hands folding on his stomach. "Long bad day. Liz called, Jimmy e-mailed, my girlfriend dumped me because I'm a 'sullen loner', and you're up in your fairy-tale town… Down here, whatever… _Everyone Loves Luke_ , that should be a show, y'know? I can be a punchline. Why can't you be like everyone else, Jess…" The dark eyes slid sideways. "Why can't you be like everyone else, _Lorelai_. She had me pegged first time she saw me. Birds of a broken wing feather metaphor thing. She was right."

Stunned beyond his usual wordlessness into a new realm of silence, Luke did what he could. He retrieved the mug, found a bottle of water in a small refrigerator and handed it to his nephew with a gruff, "You should eat something."

"So your mom did crack and drank herself half to death, Jess, no reason to be a broody loser keeping a book between you and the world all the time," sighed Jess, and that time, Luke knew his nephew was quoting the now-ex-girlfriend. "Liz said I should be like you. How's that going for us?"

Eyeing his sorrowing, drunk nephew with a lump in his throat, Luke admitted, "Not so good."

Jess's eyes drifted up to the ceiling. Then the eyelids covered them. Luke rose, to tiptoe away.

Jess asked crisply, "Is that really why you didn't tell her about April? Or let April around her and Rory?"

Feeling as if that queasy sensation had overtaken his brain, Luke yelped, "Yes! No! I don't know! I wasn't thinking! I had to be with Anna."

Jess sat up, puckering his forehead in a curious frown. "You mean April, right?"

"I said that!" Luke scrubbed at his head in agitation, then groaned. "Crap. I didn't, did I."

"Nope."

Luke finished his whiskey in a gulp. "I won't be a deadbeat loser but I can't, it's not…"

Jess pointed. "We've got dictionaries if you want to look up some words."

Luke found himself dangerously near punching someone, though his chosen target was himself. Desperate to change the subject, he gently said, "Hey. The girl who broke up with you. She's an idiot."

Jess flung an arm over his eyes. "Maybe she's not. Don't talk. Words don't break bones, but they do hurt. And they _last._ " He flapped his free hand lazily at the bookshelves. "Much better than people. Much better than King Jess of Loserville. What's it like to _win_?"

Stricken, Luke reached as if a touch could somehow ease Jess's pain, and dropped his hand.

"Look at you. You treat Lorelai like crap, she rebounds to Rory's dad, boom, you're off the hook. You don't commit to Rachel, but hey, she left, you're the good guy. You left me with Liz, but you took me in eventually, score another one for Luke Danes. They probably gave you a trophy. Another trophy. Me, I'm just Jess the jerk. Liz the loser's loser son."

Jess drifted into a snoring sleep as he said _loser son_.

"Yeah, I'm a real winner, all right," said Luke dully to his knees. " _Crap_."

GG GG GG

AN: This chapter didn't go where I told it to. Stupid chapter. *sigh* Stupid drunk Jess with his stupid drunk rant. *headdesk* Yes, I know Luke loved Rory, but anyone else notice that April and the Gilmores didn't co-exist in Luke's life in S7? That April was shipped off to another state before the Gilmores re-entered Luke's life?


	4. Chapter 4: LukeLorelai

Winning is Losing Chapter Four

Disclaimer: Said it before. Wash, rinse, repeat.

AN: Final chapter. If you stuck it out this long, I am extremely grateful, and am incredibly thankful for all reviews and PMs, positive, negative or otherwise. We're all here to fill in the blanks left by the show.

Just to clarify: This occurs well after the events of the first three chapters, and I probably should've split it into two chapters, but I lost my nerve. Also, I am posting again so soon in order to prevent myself from re-writing this a fifteenth time. *headdesk*

GG GG GG

"I can't do this!" wailed Lane, and bit her lower lip. "The boys are fussing, I'm exhausted, I'm not a musician, I'm mammary glands that wait tables!"

Luke turned to tell Lane to watch her language around customers, but the diner was empty, other himself, Caesar, and Lane's husband, Zach.

Who walked to Lane, took the tub of lunch-rush dishes from her hands, and held those hands. "Hey, babe. You are still the heppest of Hep Alien, now go home, get a nap, and go to rehearsal, okay? Mama Kim's got the boys, I've got your shift."

"But you have to rehearse for the gig!" moaned Lane against his chest.

"Hey. You're the muse of Hep Alien, and no one drums the heart like you. Home. Sleep. Spend some time with the skins." Zach grinned the doofus grin that Luke had often considered proof of intoxication, but was merely natural tendency. "Love you, babe."

"You mean it?" Lane whispered, eyes big behind her glasses. "I gotta feel some rock and roll or…"

"Go on, Luke won't mind, right, dude?"

Lane was a better employee, but Luke shrugged. "Yeah. Go on."

Lane squealed, leapt up to kiss Zach briefly on the lips. "You. Are. The. _Best._ Have I told you today I love you?"

"Yeah, but I don't mind hearing it again."

The exchange gave Luke an urge to brush his teeth against sugar rot, and bile-green envy.

Zach whistled under his breath as he took the tub of dishes into the back, apron tied neatly around him by his loving wife.

Luke wiped tables without seeing them. Without seeing the calendar telling him it was now the end of August, April was gone to New Mexico, and here he remained. Wiping tables. In Stars Hollow. No loving wife. No banter. No understanding hands.

He hadn't seen Lorelai, spoken to Lorelai, since the argument. He no longer looked up when the bells jingled, expecting to see her. He no longer kept _her_ mug out where it could be used. It had been an eerie return to the previous summer, minus Christopher Hayden.

He'd gone to Jess to rant. Ended up nursing Jess through a few days of booze and a break-up. Come home to the same emptiness he'd left, blindly going through the routine of his days. Broken by a few weeks with April. Out on the boat. Fishing. Talking. Realizing this teenager he loved was still a stranger in many ways, an infinitely precious mystery. She'd worried about her hair. And sunblock. And things that the April he'd first met wouldn't consider. She'd asked him about lip gloss colors. He'd had to nix her wearing a two-piece swimsuit, mortified by the mere idea of it. Bikinis were for sexually desirable females, not _his kid_. She'd only seemed familiar when she enthused at the coastal habitat reserve, gone on about water ecology, and identified species using the guidebook he had bought her.

At Lorelai's suggestion. Before the argument. Before he'd said _You're a joke_.

All in all, Luke had not had the best summer. So much so that even Taylor failed to rile him. It had taken him three days to notice a flyer in his window, and another two to bother taking it down.

The door's bells jangled.

He didn't look up. Zach could handle customers.

Lorelai said, "Luke. I need to talk to you for a minute. Do you have time?"

Lorelai never asked if he had time. Luke concluded this was a hallucination, and scrubbed at a jelly stain left by Kirk. He knew it to be Kirk's doing, since it was a heart with Lulu's name in it.

A check appeared in front of his eyes.

The dollar amount stunned him into a " _Geez!_ " Then a rasping, "Fifty…"

Lorelai ticked off on her fingers. "The investment in the Dragonfly, and the house improvements."

"You don't have…"

"I sold the house."

His blood seemed to have changed to bubbling ice water. " _What_?"

Arms tight around her middle, Lorelai reddened, but her voice remained steady. "You remember my dad said a few months ago things could go bad. Wall Street, he meant. And a lot of my guests are that crowd. Or want to be. Or work for them. He suggested I get a cash reserve built up for the inn to cover any bad times, and all I had to sell was the house. Someone wanted a fixer-upper summer home as a wedding gift for their son." Lorelai's smile was as wintry as her gray business suit, which gave Luke an eerie flashback to Nicole. Buttoned down and suited was appropriate, but it was not _Lorelai_.

He waited for a punchline. It never came.

It was not a joke. None of this was a _joke_.

He groped for something to say besides the obvious, and resorted to the obvious. "Where're you living?"

"Well, to keep a cash reserve for the inn, and still pay back what I owe you," Lorelai replied, nerves showing in the sudden fidgeting with her purse, "with my parents. But next month I have my own place again. One of the apartments on Second."

Luke slapped the cleaning rag on the table, scowling. "Those are tiny, you'll never fit all your junk in one of those!"

"All my junk," answered Lorelai, jaw tightening, "is either in a dumpster or stored in the basement at the inn."

"That basement can flood."

Lorelai said sensibly, "Everything is in plastic bins."

Out of objections, of discernible emotions, Luke studied the check. "How'd you sell the house that fast, without Miss Patty and Babette knowing?" Unspoken was his "Without my hearing about it?"

"Mom. She told my dad she could have buyers in three days when he started lecturing her about minding her own business, and well, never mind, you've met them, you know how they are." Lorelai's fingers tied themselves into knots around her purse strap. "And they paid market, so… Anyway, I wanted you to have your money back."

Of the thousand things to say, he managed a mere, pained, "Lorelai."

"Things are better, with my parents. Mom and I had some good talks, real talks, no yelling or anything, and, y'know, we're doing better, and she doesn't criticize everything I do every time I do anything, and I don't assume she's trying to put me down every time she opens her mouth. Even if she makes me crazy, it makes Dad happy for us to get along, and that's good, so anyway, there's your money, and I'm sorry. About us. About everything. About… About _me_ , I guess." Her hand flew to her hair, but she could not tuck it behind an ear as she often did. It was smoothed back into some sort of clip, no sign of unruly curls.

Desperate to stop these awful words, he blurted, "Coffee?"

"No. Thanks, though."

He tried again. "Lorelai."

"Luke, if you'd said that, when you first knew about April, we could've talked about it, but..." Lorelai swallowed so hard that Luke heard the gulp, but her face maintained a terrible façade of calm. "When Rory hit high school, I felt like I finally had a chance to do what everyone else did in their twenties. Only…" She sighed, shrugged one shoulder. "Only that's not how life works, and I just made a big mess of everything, and I'm not going to be married with another kid, I get that now. I don't regret giving up anything for Rory," she added viciously, glaring at him as if he'd said she should. "I'm sorry, I'm babbling, I had a speech, it was only fifty words, Sookie counted to make sure, but I forgot it when I came in."

Luke held the check out to her. "You need this for the inn."

"You need it," she countered, back to that brisk business-like tone, which reminded him uncomfortably of Nicole _and_ Anna. "For April's education."

Taking refuge in anger, Luke snarled, "Why're you doing this?"

"It's the right thing to do." Her mouth smiled. The blue eyes did not. "Take care, Luke."

Luke crumpled the check in his hand, tossing it on the table. "Take care? That's it? That's all? Everything we went through, and I get _take care_?"

"It's all I have left," Lorelai said tightly, and walked quickly, forlornly out of the diner.

Luke wasn't a fool. He knew that Lorelai had enthused about kittens, snowflakes, cartoons, because they were, to her, what she'd never had when a person should have them. In childhood. When magic was allowed, though adults were the ones who needed it. Yet she'd _stopped_. The irrepressible Lorelai had _stopped._

She'd frustrated him for years. That refusal to act her age.

He acted his age. What had it gotten him?

A check for fifty thousand dollars, a string of exes, and a diner.

Luke tried to smooth the check, the looping letters of her signature at least the same as always.

"Hey, man, you okay?" asked Zach.

Luke stared stonily at the kid who was, technically, of an age to be his own biological child. He was, after all, not a virgin nor a monk, and he hadn't waited for marriage. He hadn't waited for his eighteenth birthday. He'd stood in this self-same spot when his father lectured him on that and the perils of teen parenthood.

"Want some advice from a happily married man?"

Luke bit out, "You're…" and shut up. Zach was happy, married, and legally a man. Correct on all points, to Luke's seething dismay.

"You can be right, or you can be happy, but sometimes, dude," said Zach, patting him on the back, "you can't be both."

"You ever see a happy loser?" snapped Luke, echoing a dozen coaches of track and baseball he'd known in his life.

"Dunno, what's a loser?" shrugged Zach, and calmly went about refilling ketchup bottles.

GG GG GG

Lorelai rocked on the porch of the inn, a cup of coffee growing cold in her hands.

She'd thought she'd become an adult when the stick turned pink. Maturity, however, didn't happen that quickly. Or, she reflected, simply. Nor easily. In fact, it basically sucked.

A party, a kiss, a chuppah, a slice of pie, a promise of lobster, and there she sat, with what she truly had to call her own. An inn that might not survive an economic downturn, a daughter grown up and away, a best friend who would always be fine because nobody would refuse to pay for Sookie's cooking, a neurotic dog who wouldn't come out from under the porch. Possibly ever. There was also a small matter of aging parents, but somehow, the dog under the porch bothered her more. She could possibly do something about the dog.

A board creaked as someone walked along the porch. Lorelai mentally added it to her list of Things to Pay Someone to Fix. "What now, Tobin?"

A too-familiar voice rumbled, "Not Tobin."

Lorelai buried her face in the mug of tepid coffee. "It's your money, Luke. Fair and square."

"It was your _house."_

"Not really, no, not in the end, and that's why I gave you the money," explained Lorelai brightly, clinging frantically to the mug. "I don't want you to lose the money you put into the inn if things go bad. And I know how expensive it is for kids to get a good education, or I'd never have had Friday night dinners with my parents and I'm babbling again, I apologize."

Eyes narrowed, Luke snapped, "I don't need help paying for April's education!"

"Then buy new kitchen stuff for the diner," Lorelai replied dully, "or take a building away from Taylor, whatever you want."

"Why the hell is the dog under the porch?"

She shrugged. There was a certain freedom in not taking up the challenge radiating from Luke. In not falling into the dance of their give-and-take, yell-and-pout, love-and-lose.

He perched on the rail, arms crossed, and bit out, "I did think about that. Rory's stuff. And when I look back, yeah, it was part of the whole…" His hand flicked the air. "Things I didn't say. That I should've said. And not said the way I said them."

"It's okay. You're right. Rory made some big mistakes, so have I, we're not great role models."

"Yeah, but I went to _Liz_."

The hurt of that still burned. Lorelai finished the last of the flavorless coffee and set down the mug. She bundled herself deeper into her cardigan. "She's family."

"I look back on it, and I don't recognize myself. Jess said a lot, you've said a lot, hell, everyone's had a say, even April, but…" Luke gave an expressive grimace to accompany an equally eloquent shrug. "I have no good reason for why I acted like that. Did that. Said that. Not when I found out about April, not in the diner a couple months ago, none of it. All I've got is… I felt attacked."

Anger uncoiled in Lorelai's chest, but she kept it from her voice and face, looking at the evening sky to calm herself. "By…?"

"All of it." Luke jammed his hands into his pockets, removed them. "Let me say this."

She nodded. She had her say. Now he had his. It was fair, no matter how unfair she wanted to be.

Luke wrung his ball cap into an unrecognizable lump. His eyes would not meet hers. "I always talked about how I hated kids, and suddenly..."

Frowning slightly, Lorelai risked a timid, "You mean, suddenly you realized people take what you say seriously? That one caught up to me…" She stopped herself, gave her head a sharp shake. "Right, not about me."

Luke thumped a fist on his thigh. "I've said a _lot._ " He slouched, untangling the wreck he'd made of his hat. "And suddenly there's marriage vows, and a daughter, and everything I say is _serious._ It's _forever_ serious."

As his voice cracked and fell, Lorelai leapt up, a hand on his hard-tensed shoulder. "Luke? Breathe. Small slow breaths, c'mon, breathe, it's okay, I know, I looked at Rory and, God, this person will take everything you say, and remember it forever, and it..."

"It _makes_ them," shuddered Luke, snaring her in an unexpected hug. "Finding out was like… _Losing_. Losing _me_."

Struggling against his embrace, then surrendering to it, Lorelai soothed, "It's okay. it's in the past, it's forgiven and..."

He turned away so abruptly that she stumbled and nearly fell. The rocker caught her, as she stared at him wide-eyed and afraid.

"I don't want us to be in the past!"

Lorelai bit down hard on the inside of her cheek to stop the retorts that rose by reflex. She and her mother had come to the point where her father laughed to see them screw up their faces against the habit of argument for the sake of argument. Unattractive, but good practice for this moment.

Luke slammed the mutilated ball cap onto his head, his hands dancing in the air. "Here, April, look, I can give you family! Auntie Liz and Uncle Weirdo and Cousin Jess! That's what you're _supposed_ to have for your kids, _family_! And she didn't have it, because of something _I_ screwed up, I thought I had to fix it for her, make it perfect! I'm not a guy who changes but then there's a kid and she's mine, and I can't be that guy but I _am_ that guy!"

Hands to her ears, Lorelai shouted, "Stop it!"

A moment later, a whining Paul Anka scampered up to her, cowering against her legs, and she reached down, rubbing his ears until her tears were under control.

"Just stop it, Luke, _please_." Lorelai crouched, holding the dog to her as a shield and for solace. He licked her face before hiding his cold nose between her breasts. "It doesn't matter now. It happened, we can't make it un-happen. I hate it. But I'm trying to be happy with what I _have_ , can we please just _stop_ this?"

The last came out of her as a wrenching sob, and she buried her face in Paul Anka's fur. He crooned a whine at her.

Luke's voice was low, difficult for her to hear. "I don't want us to stop."

"We already did," she wept into her dog's furry head.

"I'm trying to fix this! Talk it out, do that whole communicating thing!"

Cradling her dog and her losses, Lorelai cried, "Why?"

"I love you!"

"Until when?" Lorelai yelled, fury overtaking grief. The dog retreated again into the night, avoiding the light at which a few moths battered. "Until Rachel comes back again? Until I have a bad day and you don't want to deal with me? Until April visits?"

He was a shadow among shadows when he answered roughly, "Until always."

Amputation seemed best, phantom pains and all. Lorelai raised the verbal axe over herself, let it fall. "I married Chris, remember?"

"Yeah," Luke said coolly, "and I saw your face, Lorelai. When he wasn't at the hospital for you. With your dad. I saw it was all still the same, married or not, he still wasn't _there_."

Scrubbing her face with her sleeve, grateful the dark hid the carnage wrought on her mascara, Lorelai mumbled, "And you were. I know." She hiccupped into stillness, her hard-won composure splintered at her feet.

"What're you trying to win?"

The solemnity of his question shocked Lorelai into a brief and honest, "Peace."

She couldn't read his expression when he replied slowly, "At any price."

She nodded vigorously. Extreme as it was, it did simplify matters.

He slid into view, looking at her much as he had the day she told him she had slept with Christopher. "So you've given up? On all of it? Snowflakes, kittens, happy middles, happy endings, quoting movies no one knows?"

For once, _she_ resorted to monosyllables. "Yes."

The kitchen staff had gone home by the time their silence regenerated into speech.

"I'll never move to New Mexico."

"Okay," replied Lorelai, pushing herself into the rocker with a wince for body parts unaccustomed to sitting on hard wood planks.

"I apologize. For what I said about you being a joke. A bad mom."

"Oh, Luke," she said kindly as she stood, "I..."

"And," he interrupted brutally, "I don't want peace at any price."

Wishing she could hide with her dog, Lorelai said sternly, "I'm not going to take back the check."

"It's not about the damn check!"

Recoiling, Lorelai bumped into the inn's front door. She softly muttered an involuntary, "Ow."

"I want to negotiate," stated Luke, locking his eyes onto hers. "A fair and lasting peace."

Lorelai drew a shaky breath. She forced herself to ask, "Why?"

A strange expression overtook Luke's face, something between sorrow and hope. "I'm tired of you and me. I want _us."_

The man who had said things capable of tearing her world to shreds, if he said anything, found the exact words that told her own truth.

Luke had always known her too well. He immediately pressed his advantage. "Tomorrow night. Six o'clock. Sniffy's. I'll pick you up here at five-thirty."

She didn't bother to glare. "I don't get a say?"

"Sure," answered Luke, with a sudden grin. "Do you want it to be a date, or a not-date?"

Much remained to be said. Negotiated, as Luke had aptly put it. She stalled, scowling as she tried for banter. "I dunno, what's your gut say? Am I the kind of person your gut says…"

"My gut got me Nicole and Anna, to hell with my gut," said Luke brusquely. "So?"

"Not-date." Before he could react, Lorelai concluded, "We can discuss terms of a possible date after that."

"Okay, that's a start," said Luke, and a decade fell from him when he smiled. "Stand still."

She froze as his hand came at her face, overwhelmed by memory and fear.

His thumb very lightly wiped something off her cheek. "Dog hair. See you tomorrow."

Lorelai stood on the steps of the porch of the inn, watching Luke stroll into the night, and eventually touched her cheek. "Tomorrow," she said softly, and did not dread the word.

GG GG GG

END

AN: Anyway, there it is. Let's all assume negotiating got them many happy years, lots of hot va-va-voom, and an emotionally stable golden retriever. Possibly they adopt a group of children to save them from a life of air pants and "Huzzah!" Luke realizes he doesn't have to stick to something because "that's who he is", and Lorelai realizes she doesn't have to self-destruct, and someone sings "Lalalalala" in the background.

I want it to be clear that I did not want either L to take "more" or "less" blame or responsibility. The dynamics of the duo had to change. This was how I did it.

Cheers.


End file.
